QUEEN STREET IN FLOOD.

Auckland Star, Volume XLII, Issue 137, 10 June 1911, Page 5

QUEEN STREET IN FLOOD.

A TORRENTIAL DOWNPOUR. SURCHARGED SEWERS. AMPHIBIOUS PEDESTRIANS AND " DROWNED CELLARS. "

Auckland was visited by a downpour of rain this morning of such tropical volume that the lower part of Queen Street was for a space converted from wall to wall into a river, which boiled round some of the corners in a turgid yellow flood more than knee deep. The rain, which bad been falling steadily since early morning, settled down to something quite out of the common about ten o'clock, tbe clouds opening their flood gales, and letting it down ou the city in a solid sheet of moisture, the supply lasting out the best part o£ an hour. Down the sloping ground the water swept from all sides into Queen Street, till surcharged traps and torrent swollen sewers could contain the everincreasina tide no longer, vomiting the muddy current hack into the street, j which very soon was transformed in its luwer levels from a thoroughfare into a river, through which the tramears and other vehicles swished their passage in a grand smother. Pedestrians for a little while surveyed the new waterway with more interest than concern, but when the flood lapped over the kerbs and showed a disposition to push hostilities to the very shop doors, while the rain continued at an ever merrier rattle, the laugh began to shape the other way for those whose business down or up town was urgent, and the idle and well-van-taged ones soon had a spice of comedy added to the entertainment. Grown desperate with haste, men and boys began at first to make little hops across the water-drowned as.phalte. possibly under some dim notion that by keeping one foot in the air the other wouldn't get wet. but when one unfortunate hopped into a gutter, slippi d, a.nd spreadeagled on the rising mixture of mud and water, a roar of unsympathetic laughter w<nt up in a ribald shout, and the other forders straightway took warning and waded into it with fine abandon. Dainty ladies tucked up tinht skirts as high as th= convenances would permit, and took to the water like ducks of another order, and soon the amphibian exercise <rew too general to draw comment unless some hapless wight trod unwitting into a gutter and splashed himself to the eyes. it continued for nearly balf-an-hour, while cellars were flooded and damage was perpetrated by the michievous waters wherever opportunity offered. j But so soon as the rain ceased, which did as though turned'", off short at the fountain head, the flooded ' street was quickly relieved of its wet load, the foot-paths looking like a sea shore rippled by the tide as the waters subsided. With|in a quarter of an hour of the cessation lot" the rain, the last of the flood was pouring into the sewer traps, and the workmen of the City Council were already busy with shovel and broom on the inches of silt which had collected in many places along the thoroughfare.

DETAILS OF DAMAGE. Mr. J. y. Dickson appears to have suffered most severely. The sewer not bein<* able to take the flood water the cellars under his shop soon filled to a depth of 5 feet, and but a few pounds' worth of the valuable stock in it was saved. The water even found its way on to the floor of the shop, running" from behind the counter and ol> at the side door like a mill race. Mr. Dickson assesses th> damage done at Detwecn £500 and £000.

The following additional places were flooded, and suffered more or less damage:—About one and a-half feet of water found its way into Messrs. John Burns and Co.'s cellar, doing about £50 worth of damage. Mr. LeKoy states that he suffered about £40 worth of damage to his stock through the water bursting through the barricade he had erected, and flooding his cellar to a depth of two feet. Mr. Mackay's seed stock was dam aged- to the extent cf £30. Messrs. Fischer Bros.' kitchen was badly flooded, and some difficulty was experienced in preparing the mid-day meal. Messrs. Smeeton's new cellar let in some three feet of water. Evans and Co.'s fruit cellar was flooded to the depth of one foot six inches, but little damage was done. Tlie following hotels suffered severely:—The W'aitemata, tbe Thames, the Waverley and the Occidental. In the case of the Occidental, the kitchen was flooded to tbe depth oi five feet. The water burst through the walls and the roof of the Supreme Court, and flooded several rooms. Milne and Choyce's cellar was flooded to a depth of nine inches through a door at the back being left open.

In the upper portions of Queen-street the damage done was considerable, th* bursting of pipes causing the flooding of cellars. Even as high up as Tonson Carlick's damage was done in this re sped. AFTER THE FLOOD. A "Star" representative this morning made a round of the basements in the principal buildings in the lower pirt of the City, and was able to ascertain some interesting particulars. In nearly every case where a -oeil.ir or basemT.t area existed, there was an inuudation. In some .of the bigger blocks, the cellars run through from street to street, and great bodies of water congregated, looking for all the world like underground lakes. Everywhere men were busy with buckets and brooms, working with trousers turned above their knees. In the fruit storage basements hundreds of cases of fruit were floating round, and where the water had gone down, the cellars were thick with silt. Even where the gutteriii" was not to blame, cellars were inundate-! with water as the result of the sewers being overcharged. In the Victoria Arcade, the basement was flooded, and all the hotels in the lower part of the City were swamped out in the basement area. Off Fort Street Lane the numerous low level business places suffered severely. Butter stores and fruit stores were simply flooded out', and the damage was considerable.

QUEER SIGHTS IN HOTELS AND

RESTAURANTS

j An extraordinary sight was that wit j nested on visiting the principal hotels j and restaurants in the lower part oi j the city. In nearly every instance the i kitchens are below the street level, and whin the flood water came down, even t'ne fires m the stoves were put out. At 'midday, visited by a pressman, it was amusing to behold luncheons in progress on the ground floors, while below" the cooks and their attendants were working knee-deep in wafer. In several big hotels, it was decidedly queer to see the stoves burning brightly, the tables ladened with steaming food, and the cooks and pantrymen carrying, out their work knee-

restaurant the piping burst, -and t'ae whole-place was inundated-, -the floor being a couple of feet under water, so "that business, had to be suspended. Tho bursting of pipes was responsible for a good deal of damage in other places, and is a strong argument in favour of tho recent recommendation of the City Sanitary Inspector (Mr. Haynes) that iron pipes at this level should replace earthenware pipes, thus reducing the risk of accident.